Rating: 
Summary: The best King in years
Review: I've been a Stephen King fan for years now, ever since my uncle told me to read "The Stand" just before the TV miniseries came out. By now I've gotten through about half of his library (give me a break, I got a late start!) and I've read every new book as it has come out since 1994 -- so I think I'm in a good position when I say that King hasn't been this gripping in years."From a Buick 8" begins (not unlike King's "Bag of Bones") with the death of one of the main characters, Pennsylvania State Trooper Curtis Wilcox. Curtis's grief-stricken son Ned turns to his father's police troop as a surrogate family and they take him in. But Troop D has a secret -- a secret they've kept for over 20 years, one that nearly consumed Curtis. In an old shed is a classic Buick Roadmaster, but one unlike anything Detroit ever put out. There's something terrible about that car, and it's time for Ned to learn the truth. Like many King fans, when I heard about this one I thought, "Another car book? King's starting to repeat himself." But the similarities to "Christine" end with the car -- this is a very different, more mature story as much about human nature as it is about monsters and other dimensions. I haven't been pulled in like this since the aforementioned "Bag of Bones." Curiously enough, in the afterward King says he wrote the first draft of this book after finishing "The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon," which I found to be one of his weaker works in recent years. (This was before his own nearly-fatal vehicular accident, by the way.) Fortunately for us all, it seems King managed to work out the kinks. King says he'll be retiring soon. If his last few works manage to convey the emotion of "From a Buick 8," I think it's safe to say he'll go out on a high note.
Rating: 
Summary: Shed B - Repository of Magic
Review: It used to be fun for Stephen King. Many of his books contained a spirit of mischief, glee and a lot of "gotchas!" "Buick 8" is a mature work, sadder and wiser, nostalgic and uncertain of the certainties. The big answer is: there is no answer. Pennsylvania State Police, Troop D towed an abandoned car to their headquarters in 1979. Its driver had stopped for gas and disappeared. The squad discovered the car repelled dirt and self-repaired scratches, and its tire treads would not even hold a pebble. Sgt. Sandy Dearborn decides the "car" ("because you have to call it something") merits further investigation and stores it in the barracks unused Shed B---and there it remains for the next thirty years, with only Troop D aware of just how strange this thing is. In the present, a grieving son of Trooper Wilcox (who had brought the car in) is trying to get closure on his father's sudden death by vehicular homicide. Ned helps out around the barracks and is given temporary duty during his summer before college. He wants to know the story of the Buick. The sergeant and troopers decide to tell him---of the "lightquakes" (a Stephen King word if I ever heard one!), the strange and disgusting creatures the car would bring forth, the disappearing of Trooper Ennis and the glimpses of alternate universes. Different troopers tell the story, Sandy taking the lead. Sandy emphasizes that the "goings-on" were intermittent, not a daily thing, and weeks and months would go by with nothing happening at all. Troop D would almost forget the Buick. Ned is an impatient listener and his interest in the car becomes compulsive. The 1979 references were so nostalgic and ephemeral, I felt we were talking about 100 years ago rather than thirty. I had a slight aggravation with the esprit de corps of Troop D. Not just Sandy, but all of them seemed to have no life outside of the State Troopers. Their loyalty was first and foremost to the Troop, then the State Police, and way down on the list: family, friends and outside interests. When they were off-duty, they gathered at the barracks; they even slept and ate there. King's emphasis that day-to-day life frequently transcends the wonder of the supernatural in Shed B was hard on the pace of the story. If Troop D can forget for months at a time, so can the reader. It is true that we cannot constantly and obsessively be aware of our own mortality and where we fit in the universe, but we do need the focus for King's story to have maximum impact. "Buick 8" was not meant to be presented as a leisurely told tale spread over many years. I think it would have worked better as a novella. I would call "From a Buick 8" medium-King. A race to the bookstore for all diehard Kings fans (me); others might want to wait for the paperback.
-sweetmolly- Amazon Reviewer
Rating:
Summary: Great dialog as always, but too long
Review: In January 1999, I went to a talk in Los Angeles by Harry Turtledove. Some of you may know him. He's a very successful science fiction author, with many novels and short stories to his credit. Anyway, during the question session, someone asked who he considered a better writer. He said Stephen King; that King could write dialog for characters in contemporary America like no one else. Certainly, based on objective measures like hardcover sales, King is at a level above Turtledove, who is no slouch himself! Which brings me to this novel. King demonstrates his usual superlative ability to transcribe dialog that captures the cadences of authenticity, without descending into banality. His descriptions of the experiences of a group of police in western Pennsylvania who end up owning a Buick that is a portal to another, quite unearthly dimension, are engrossing. But, dare I reveal this to you of the plot? Nothing much happens. It is a quiet, explicitly retrospective narrative. Though a little too long. It could easily have been trimmed down to the length of one of his novellas in "Four Past Midnight", each of which I consider superior to this. In those, each plot was taut and there was a discernable climax. Here, unfortunately, not much of one. King sometimes lets his fingers run off the keyboard. For King fans, yes, you should read this book. Don't raise your expectations too high beforehand.
Rating:
Summary: A boy, a car, and a mystery.
Review: Ned Wilcox's father, Pennsylvania State Police Trooper Curt Wilcox, is dead, killed in a horrific accident by a drunk driver (the uncomfortable parallels to the author's own accident are nothing more than a spooky coincedence, or so King informs the Constant Reader in the Author's Note). Sandy Dearborn is not surprised when Ned begins to do odd jobs around his late father's Troop Barrack, but he is dismayed when Ned eventually uncovers Troop D's scary little secret, the Buick Roadmaster hidden in Shed B. The Troop now must tell Ned an unpleasent tale of the unkown. From A Buick 8 is, if the recent interviews and press announcements are to be believed, Stephen King's final original novel (only the remaining three Dark Tower novels are yet to be published). If that is truly the case and King has finally kicked his publishing addiction, then the one time King of Horror has gone out with a mature, albeit frustrating, work. What makes Buick 8 frustrating is that it deals with the Great Mystery of Life, the Roadmaster that is less a Buick than a portal to some horrid alien dimension (perhaps the same one that Project Arrowhead burst into in King's classic novella The Mist) is clearly meant to symbolize death, or loss, or both. The predominant message of the book seems to be that we must learn to live with it as opposed to conquering it, or so a first reading of the book seems to want to say. King's writing, as always, is accessible and his characters are real, the novel more than once offering up a poignant and painful naturalist photo of life in today's world. Some may complain that King did not go out with a more traditional novel, but don't be discouraged. The King went out with a mature and literate work that invites revisiting. Recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: King goes out with a semi-bang
Review: Stephen King has been announcing his exit from writing for a while now; he says that "From a Buick 8" will be his last book (the final unpublished volumes of "The Dark Tower" don't count, he says), so it would have been nice if he went out with a bang. Alas, this book is more like a banglet; it's not a whimper, but not nearly the pyrotechnics he's shown us he's capable of. The book starts off very well indeed; a mysterious stranger pulls up to a gas station in a Buick, gets out, and disappears; the Buick turns out to be portal into another dimension that sounds like a very King-ian hell. Occasionally, weird, loathsome, obnoxious critters come out of that hell via the Buick, and humans have been drawn into it via the same route. What makes this book a disappointment is that King has developed an annoying habit of pulling his punches. He gives us a tantalizing glimpse of that netherworld, but glimpses is all we get; the old Stephen King would have dragged us into it kicking and screaming and showed it to us in all its unspeakable horror. King used to write real horror novels; "Buick 8" is much more frustrating than frightening. I think I'll re-read a few of his early books such as "Salem's Lot", "Needful Things", and most especially "Pet Sematary", to remember what King was like when he was really at his best.
Rating:
Summary: A Good Place for the Ride to Stop.
Review: Stephen King has this kind of novel down to a formula, one he can repeat over and over for the rest of his life, if he chooses. The present incarnation of this book, while more mature than say, CHRISTINE (1983), has its moments, sloppy and predictable though some of them are. King has said as much himself in a recent article in ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY. I found FROM A BUICK 8 a little boring, and a little tired, but nevertheless I rather liked it, as here, as with many of King's recent works, the "horror" serves as a background and the REAL theme relates to timeless human concerns. But he's done that before, too, and better. Worse, too, hence my 3 out of 5. And if he means it, in saying that this book is a good place to end the publishing spree on, I'm not gonna argue. Because maybe it is.
Rating:
Summary: From a Buick 8
Review: Stephen King has being saying he's going to retire. I'm not sure I believe it. But I do think perhaps he should retire from writing horror. From a Buick 8 is by far the strongest in its real-world elements. The Pennsylvania State Troopers are interesting, appealing characters (though I wanted to know more about Sandy, the primary narrator). I found myself more curious about their on-the-job adventures, and more drawn to their camaraderie, than excited by the horror element in this novel. Which isn't very interesting. It's the gate-to-another-world thing that King did so much better in Rose Madder. It's not bad, it's not boring, but it doesn't sparkle. I wonder if we might see a new pen name, and a thriller/mystery slant, from Mr. King.
Rating:
Summary: King lite
Review: It's a real pleasure to read a book by Stephen King that isn't big enough to choke a horse! Although I really love his works, my criticism of his last few books have to do with the extraordinary length of them; books simply crying out for an editor with an active pen. This work, however, gets into the plot and speeds right along, without all of the usual excess verbiage. Perhaps Mr. King is really serious about soon ending his active writing career, and wants to leave us with works that will be remembered for their quality, rahtrer than their quantity. This book tells a riveting tale from the viewpoint of many vioces, and tells it well. There's not a lot of what we would consider "plot", but it is mesmerizing all the same. We get many insights into the human heart and condition, and also are given a quick lesson in the ins and outs of day-to-day work by state policemen. You grow to identify with many of the characters and their idiosyncrasies, and with them experience the terror of the unknown and, in the end, the unanswered questions posed by the unusual Buick that belongs to the barracks. When I read works of this type, I hope that Mr. King changes his mind about retiring, and continues to give us many more years, and many more books.
Rating:
Summary: Why stop now?
Review: Dreamcatcher and Buick 8 are two of the better books I've read. Stephen King continues to get better with each novel, so why stop now? I can understand wanting to take a break "until further notice", but hopefully for our sakes he'll get bored in a while and treat us again.
Rating: 
Summary: King's Latest is Lamest
Review: Well, perhaps not his lamest, but very, very close. As someone who has read and re-read every King book, I was relieved that this hastily slung together rehashing of familiar King territory will be his "last." Then again, King can shine in certain places and his amazing ability to bring you inside a character's consciousness almost makes it worth it to suffer through. The bottom line: if you're a King junky, you're going to read it no matter what.
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